Exit polls tell us that, above all else, the midterm elections were about jobs.

Voters want Congress to create jobs and end high unemployment. A good opportunity is at hand. On Nov. 30, emergency unemployment benefits for those who have exhausted their normal benefits are set to expire. Congress must decide whether to extend them again for the millions of workers who are still without a job more than 26 weeks after they first became unemployed.

Enormous economic benefits, including job creation, are likely to develop if we continue providing emergency unemployment compensation. But there is also a powerful moral case to be made — the jobless workers have no other source of income and millions might fall into deep poverty without it.

Yet two arguments against another extension have been gaining traction, even among Democrats. First is that unemployment compensation discourages people from seeking work. In other words, workers treat it like a paid vacation. If we didn’t have so many weeks of benefits, this argument goes, then the unemployment rate would be far lower.

In ordinary times, this might be worth examining. But when the economy has lost 8 million jobs, it makes no sense.

Yes, unemployment compensation makes workers less desperate to find a job. But it doesn’t change the number of available jobs. Remember, there is only about one vacant job for every five unemployed workers — or about 3 million job openings for the economy’s almost 15 million jobless workers. Plus an additional 9 million people in part-time jobs, who are looking for full-time work.

This means that, no matter how hard they try, only one out of five could possibly find a job. Four won’t — no matter how hard they try and no matter how desperate they are.

So ending long-term unemployment compensation means that millions of unemployed workers are likely to be cut off from their only means of support and thrown into poverty. It won’t create a single job. It only punishes workers, and the families of workers, jobless through no fault of their own.

Economists know this. But it is also common sense. Since our economy lost 8 million jobs, there aren’t enough jobs to go around. Ending unemployment compensation won’t create them.

In fact, ending unemployment compensation for the long-term unemployed will kill jobs — hundreds of thousands of them. Many studies show that paying unemployment insurance benefits is one of the best job creation programs we have.

Why? By putting money in the pockets of needy families, who are strapped for resources and will spend every dollar on food, rent, gas and other necessities, unemployment compensation supports employment at supermarkets, gas stations, farms, trucking companies and apartment buildings. Almost every dollar paid in benefits is quickly spent at businesses, small and large, that use the money to pay their own employees.

What would happen if the federal government stopped funding extended unemployment compensation, now roughly $5 billion of benefits each month?

Jobs would not magically be created.

In fact, jobs would be lost. Businesses would lose $5 billion of sales each month and would have to lay off employees or cut their hours. Economists estimate that roughly 900,000 full-time-equivalent jobs would be lost over the course of the year, because of the drop in spending

This job loss explains why the deficit hawk argument is wrong. Some deficit hawks argue that the growing federal deficit imperils the economy and is a drag on growth. They want deficit reduction immediately, and they include programs like unemployment compensation in their cuts.

But other hawks, like David Walker of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, argue for more deficit spending in the short term, until the unemployment rate has improved substantially. They understand that unemployment insurance actually helps the economy — increasing gross domestic product by $200 for every $100 spent.

What the economy needs now is growth — more economic activity, not less. But if Congress fails to extend unemployment benefits, it will pull $65 billion out of the economy and decrease GDP growth by about $130 billion.

Congress has the opportunity to show the voters it heard them loud and clear. It can do the right thing for jobs and the economy — and the long-term unemployed. It should jump on this chance.

Ross Eisenbrey is a former commissioner of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission and served for many years as a staff attorney in the House and committee counsel in the Senate. He is vice president of the Economic Politic Institute.